This is no plot for a B movie that bombed at the box office, but the official police account of the death of Victor Macaldo, accused triggerman in the murder of Manila Councilor Chika Go. Police said Macaldo was being taken from his detention cell at the Western Police District headquarters in Ermita to a Manila court near City Hall. Along the way, two men on a motorcycle purportedly opened fire on the police vehicle. Police said Macaldo appeared to be the target of the gunmen. Macaldo, in handcuffs, allegedly tried to grab one of his security escorts’ gun. No one can tell if he was hit by bullets from the gunmen or his police escorts. The gunmen – if indeed there were gunmen – escaped. Macaldo’s security escorts were unharmed.
How many people care if a murderer gets killed? It’s not the first time that an accused murderer has been gunned down after allegedly trying to grab his police escort’s gun. That fate befell the accused rapist-killer of an eight-year-old girl a few years ago in Manila. But if that case drew little public indignation, it was because pieces of evidence and witnesses tended to establish the guilt of the dead suspect.
In the case of Macaldo, he did not even resemble a police sketch of the triggerman, although witnesses reportedly identified him as Go’s killer. Police said Macaldo had confessed that he had been hired to murder Go. Macaldo could have been telling the truth. Alive, however, he could have pinned down the mastermind of the murder – a fact that has not yet been established. Now we’ll never know the truth.